INTRODUCTION: THE ESSENTIALIZATION OF MARGARET MEAD

Authors

Nancy McDowell, Beloit CollegeFollow

Abstract

Margaret Mead and her contributions to Pacific anthropology play a large role in the discipline, and anthropologists need to consider her work carefully and in context. Evaluators of Mead are often guilty of simplifying her work rather than assessing its full complexity. The reasons for this phenomenon are examined here: several commentators have not read the work carefully, while others select only some aspects of it to support their analyses. Many misrepresentations are the result of a failure to consider her work in its appropriate historical context, and a few employ Mead as a symbol or trope for broader phenomena, such as cultural determinism or colonial oppression. Each of the papers in this volume is considered as an example of what can be learned when Mead's work is looked at without essentializing it: contributions such as these are beginning to appear, contributions that not only place the debate in its appropriate framework but also use it to further our understanding of anthropology, its assumptions, methods, and history in a wider intellectual, social and political context.

Recommended Citation

McDowell, Nancy (2005) "INTRODUCTION: THE ESSENTIALIZATION OF MARGARET MEAD," Pacific Studies Journal: Vol. 28: No. 2, Article 1.
Available at: https://digitalcollections.byuh.edu/pacific-studies-journal/vol28/iss2/1